Mini Evaluation

When I first started this course, I had absolutely no idea on how to animate or even begin to animate. I had come from an illustration background with an obsession of animation, games and comics, and I wanted to aim to make my animation cut scenes for games and create character designs. I remember the proud feeling I got when I made my first ever animation, Surprise!, I had difficulty with animating in photoshop, I couldn't get my head around the timeline panel, so I just used the frame by frame panel to animate with. I really enjoyed making such a short story, focusing on character designs and how to get the storytelling across in an interesting manner with the time that was available. The more I animated the more I became comfortable with animating in photoshop and learning new animating packages, like after effects and Maya.  I found my love for storyboards, near the end of first year and continued this passion for storyboards through second and third year.

During third year I set out to be extremely ambitious, expanding my knowledge of film theory and creating a short concept, character design, background design and storyboards for my practical to show the skills that I had learnt from this, and made my own pilot episode from scratch. I made everything from the concept to storyboards to character designs to animating and editing, and I collaborated with a student from Leeds College of Music for my music score and worked with the voice actor from second year collaborative animation, A History of Cake. By animating on this project, I found my love for animation again, and I want to continue animating alongside storyboarding and character/background design.

By researching into industry through this module with support from tutors, I feel confident about applying for jobs and working in the industry, building up my social presence and applying for MA courses. Thanks to this course I have learnt invaluable skills and techniques towards my practice that I can confidently take into the animation industry.